Missives of a Baseball Milquetoast

The free agency hot stove reached its boiling point in the past week or so with announcements of Kyle Tucker, Alex Bregman, Bo Bichette, and Cody Bellinger finally signing contracts with teams ahead of next season. We are a few weeks away from pitchers and catchers arriving at Spring Training, so hopefully, your team has made moves to give you hope going into 2026! My San Francisco Giants have not made any significant roster moves, but I sense Tony Vitello will be impactful as our skipper, and I am not giving up on us making a play for Framber Valdez, as the teams closely linked to him besides us are the Orioles, Cubs, and Mets. Each of those teams has made a big splash either through free agency or trades, so I'm keeping the faith. As a New Yorker, I am happy for Bellinger's return to the Bronx and even happier for Bichette coming to America (ie. Queens), which, combined with the news of Carlos Beltran being voted into the Hall of Fame earlier this week, serves as the inspirat...

After a few restful weeks offline I am happy to be fully back in the swing of things here with my first Fresh Fitted Friday selection of 2026 being a Buffalo Bisons cap done up in a "Buffalo Sabres" exclusive colorway from Hat Club. If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen my National Hat Day post yesterday in which I celebrated New Era's flagship MILB team with a photo of my 2003 Buffalo Bisons snapback which features the logo they wore from 1998-2003. I should note though the flying baseball which is present on this week's cap was added to the design the following season. I love how Hat Club tied in the Sabres colorway however it would also be neat to see a Buffalo Braves inspired release on this logo too! If you're interested in the lore of the former Buffalo-based basketball team that was once part of the ABA, I recommend checking out the excellent fan site  BuffaloBraves.Net I have stated many times that I am not really a "patch guy" but...

I selected the "Tri-Star Plate" alternate worn by the  Nashville Sounds for the  final Fresh Fitted Friday post of 2026 as a nod to my favorite write-up of the year which, was  1978 Nashville Sounds retro cap  in which I discussed the logistics of Nashville being a front-runner in the contention for an MLB expansion team . That post was perhaps my lengthiest one thus far however I felt compelled to carefully detail the steps involved in that effort while this week I am focusing on that potential team's name. If incorporating "Stars" in the moniker is a must, " Tri-Stars" would be a stellar choice as it properly p ays tribute to their iconic state flag although I prefer the way  "Nashville TriStars"  reads. There's a sports memorabilia company called TriStar Productions which could put a kink in my proposal but should there be no copyright issue there, calling themselves the TriStars would certainly avoid any legal entanglements with the...

We are inching toward Christmas, and I am very much looking forward to spending time over the holidays with loved ones, where we hopefully eat many memorable meals together. I I mentioned the "Feast of the Seven Fishes" in my  Gwinnett Stripers post a few weeks ago , and while it is not a tradition I grew up celebrating, it is one that I enjoy taking part in as an adult. AAfter all, I cannot imagine a seafood lover not wanting to enjoy a plethora of dishes where fish is the star. My family is planning on going out for Chinese food on Christmas Eve, so I am going to make a push toward ordering crab soup dumplings, shrimp rice noodle rolls, siu mai, and ideally a few more oceanic delicacies to get that number up to at least seven for the night. In my Chesapeake Oyster Catchers post ahead of Thanksgiving , I called out that birds and fish are two prominent themes seen on the logos of caps I wear, and this week's Fresh Fitted Friday selection falls into the latter category as...

This week was a tough one for New York Mets fans but instead of featuring a Mets cap for this week's Fresh Fitted Friday post, I figured it would be best to honor Gingerbread House Day with a tribute to my wife's unrelentless strides toward being the most unbelievably talented baker I've ever known! The inspiration for this post is  Clinker Max Almeida G.'s "Tough Cookie" design for The Clink Room and I decided to feature it here today because tomorrow is our friends' annual cookie party where my wife has historically cleaned up in the honors for many years. Even though I cannot share details on this year's entry, I have no doubt the crowd will adore her cookies. This week's Fresh Fitted Friday  selection is not going on the  Trading Block  however please don't hesitate to reach out if you want any other cap from that list and you are willing to part with any of the hats on my  Wish List . Lastly, if you'd like t check out some of Clinker...

In my last post, I mentioned that I'd be spending Thanksgiving with friends in Baltimore, and as always, it was a fantastic opportunity to catch up with them as well as their son, who is a first-year student at the University of South Carolina in Columbia. I enjoyed hearing about his experience during the semester thus far and decided the first Fresh Fitted Friday selection of December should evoke some holiday cheer as well as be one worn by a team that plays in the Palmetto State. Thankfully, Greenville Drive cap just waiting for the occasion! The Boston Red Sox typeface used here is a nod to the Drive being their High-A affiliate in the South Atlantic League since their inaugural year in 2005. Before setting up shop in Greenville, the team was based in Columbia and played as the Capital City Bombers from 1993 to 2004, and before that was known as the Columbia Mets starting in 1981.  In addition to the red in the cap's front logo, the green on the undervisor as well as in the...